


but i dont wanna fall asleep just yet

by orphan_account



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Fluff, No Spoilers, Panic Attacks, Reunions, am i ever going to write something for this fandom that isnt entrapdak? probably not, catra shows up for about 20 seconds, it's pretty brief but i thought id warn about it anyways, thats right its more entrapdak
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-16
Updated: 2020-05-16
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:41:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24214618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: In another universe, things went wrong. In this universe, things went right.That thought made Entrapta wonder about universal constants, what those might be, and how to get around them. Because of course her immediate thought would be "how badly can I make a mockery of the laws that are supposed to govern the universe?"Or, Entrapta gets home early.
Relationships: Entrapta/Hordak (She-Ra)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 233





	but i dont wanna fall asleep just yet

**Author's Note:**

> This doesnt happen after season 5 so im not making it part of the other story ive got lmao 
> 
> Also i'm lowkey planning to make a bigger story out of this but this is good and i dont want to wait to share it so im just posting it now. if i get more ideas for this 'verse ill make a series out of it

The sanctum was mostly silent 

“Hordak?”

She carried herself forward, out from where she was hidden behind the vitrine, wringing her hands together.

Hordak went stock still. Then his head jerked to the side to look at her, his expression unreadable for a moment. He bared his teeth, but didn’t react with anger at  _ her _ like she was expecting. Instead he slammed his fist on the table, snarling at… the ceiling.

“So the dreams were not enough, were they?” he hissed, “I am to be plagued with visions in the waking world, too?” 

A couple thoughts ran through her head, the most prominent of which being  _ Dreams?  _ and also  _ Who is he even talking to?  _ His nails dug into the table, and there was a screeching sound that made her wince. Okay, she could look into things another time. For now, he was gripping at the table very forcefully, and that really couldn’t be kind to his hand. 

“Stop that,” she said quietly, “you’re going to hurt yourself.”

“And why would you care?” he definitely sounded… mad. But also a little sad, too. Smad? There was almost certainly a better word for it. It was not a good tone of voice, whatever it was. “You  _ betrayed _ me. You left me. Why would you possibly care what happens to me now?”

She really should be focusing on the task at hand, but she couldn’t just hear misinformation and not correct it. “Well, technically it’s very possible to care about someone even after you betray them. She-Ra cares about Catra, as observed from her behavior, despite the fact She-Ra betrayed her  _ and _ the Horde. It’s a fascinating display of interpersonal bonds over loyalty to a specific cause, but— Anyways, it doesn’t matter, because I didn’t betray you.” She moved herself forward a bit, tilting her head. “My projections showed the portal was unstable. I was going to show you and get you to stop it. But Catra got mad, and she shocked me, and she put me on a transport to Beast Island.”

He just looked confused now. “So… you are a ghost?”

She couldn’t help but snort out a laugh. “No! You really think I couldn’t get off a transport I helped build the blueprints for? Every piece of technology I design has a failsafe I can access. It was easy to hack into it and turn it around to bring me back. I mean, we kind of crashed along the way, which is part of why it took me so long to get here, but I never got to Beast Island. So I was never in any danger.”

He was staring at her with… fear? Now. Fear and something else. It was getting a bit too complicated for her to be able to identify, so she stopped focusing on that and just focused on what he was saying instead. “But… you left me.”

She smiled, and stepped forward one more time, so she was close enough to be able to raise her hands and set them on the sides of his face. “I came back,” she said. 

Ah! She could identify this expression. This one was almost certainly ‘about to start crying.’ Which… wasn’t good. Woops.

“Oh, darn, are you—“

Then he was laughing. It started softly at first, though rose in volume as his shoulders shook and he actually did start crying. This was a very complex emotion. Emotions, plural. Had she done something wrong? Crying was usually bad. But laughing was  _ good.  _

...This was confusing.

She went to pull her hands away, but his own shot up, clamping down on her and pinning them to his face.”I apologize,” he said, voice hoarse. “I am… relieved to see you alive and well.”

“Aw!! I missed you too!!” She reached up with a few strands of hair so she could pull his hands away, moving her own to wrap around his shoulders in a hug instead. When he froze, she moved his hands (still wrapped in her hair) to reciprocate the hug. This was definitely a situation that demanded hugging. 

Her hair was getting wet, but she didn’t mind. She simply hummed in satisfaction as he rested his head on top of hers.

Then there was the sound of the door opening, and a voice calling “Lord Hordak?” and Entrapta couldn’t stop herself from flinching violently. Hordak’s grip on her tightened a bit, and he snarled.

“Hide,” he muttered under his breath, “quickly, now.”

Entrapta bit her lip, but nodded, forcing herself to pull away and pulling herself up into a shadowy section of the rafters. 

She couldn’t hear what he and Catra were discussing, tucked up here in her little hiding spot. But their tones did not sound happy. After a few minutes Entrapta heard the door slam, and Hordak sigh, followed by him saying “she’s gone.”

She dropped down to the floor. His posture was tense, his expression a scowl. His interaction with Catra was clearly not a positive one.

“Insolent brat,” he sneered. “I’ll have her executed.”

“Don’t—“ Entrapta flinched again. Confusing feelings, negative thoughts, everything was overwhelming her all at once. She didn’t like Catra, Catra wasn’t her friend, Catra had electrocuted her and tried to have her sent to an island no one returned from. But she still remembered how nice Catra used to be, how Catra and Scorpia had made her feel like she belonged for the first time in a long time. She didn’t want Catra dead, but as the same time she never wanted to see Catra’s face again. She hated Catra as much as she missed Catra and there was too  _ much— _

“Entrapta!”

She was hyperventilating. She reached up and slammed her welding mask down over her face, taking deep breaths. 

The vitrine tanks, the pipes hanging from the ceiling, the six-sided hex driver sitting on the table, the light fixture on the wall, Hordak in front of her with a concerned expression. The fabric of her gloves, the metal of her mask, the pipes she’s been hiding on before, (after reaching up to place her hands on his where they were gripping her shoulders) Hordak’s hands. The ever-present humming of the Fright Zone’s machines, the creaking of the pipes above them, Hordak’s worried tone. Metal, oil. And— she reached into her pocket and pulled out a small candy, peeling the wrapper off and sliding it under her mask to stick in her mouth— artificial sugars.

She sucked in a breath. “I’m okay,” she said, reaching over with one hand to pat Hordak’s cheek. “Don’t worry.”

He wheezed out a laugh, but it didn’t sound like there was a lot of humor in it. “I’m going to worry about you for the rest of my life. You seem to be a magnet for troublesome situations.”

“Hah. Sorry.”

His grip tightened on her. “Do not apologize,” he said, “it’s not your fault. You cannot be expected to change your behaviors to make others civil towards you. Either they appreciate you as you are, or they are  _ fools _ who are not worth your time.” 

She stared at him for a moment. Then she reached up to push the mask away, grinning at him. “Thanks, Hordak,” she said. “You’re a good friend.”

His ears flattened, and he looked away. “Yes, well…” It sounded like he was going to continue, but he just pulled his hands away and cleared his throat. It was then she caught proper sight of the fuchsia crystal set at the collar of his armor. 

She blinked. “You kept it!”

“What?”

She reached over, placing a hand on the crystal’s surface. It shone under the dim lights of the sanctum. “The crystal I gave you,” she said, scanning the First Ones’ writing on it that she knew he couldn’t read, “you kept it.”

“Of course!” He said, like there was no other option. Like he couldn’t possibly just discard her work as so many had done before. “The armor you crafted is perfect, I wasn’t about to abandon such fine craftsmanship even if the owner had turned against me. It hadn’t tried to kill me yet.” It didn’t really sound like he was done with his thoughts when he stopped talking. So she waited, silently, for him to continue. “Along with… it was one of the few things I had left that was yours. I could not bear to get rid of it.”

She ran her fingers over the crystal’s surface once more, then looked up at him and smiled wide enough that her cheeks hurt. “I’m happy you kept it,” she said honestly. His ears did that flattening thing and he looked away again. Was that a new behavior? She’d have to reference her files. 

“Oh— that… reminds me. Your personal quarters remain mostly untouched,” and he paused for a moment. (The pause was, in fact, him debating whether or not to tell her he’d almost gone in there and destroyed stuff on several different occasions. He decided to keep quiet about that.) “The room was being used for nothing before you occupied it, so I… saw no need to move your belongings. Except— Ah—“ He coughed. “Wait here.”

He stepped away, turning and heading towards the section of the sanctum she knew contained the area where he often slept. When he returned, there was a bundle of something in his hands. He didn’t look at her as he held it out.

It was… one of her blankets?

“I apologize,” he said, and he still wasn’t looking at her. “Here.”

She blinked. “Did you take it?”

“I— That is, well—“

“You can keep it,” she said, tilting her head as she gagued his reaction. “If you’d like.” 

He froze. “I— Uh—“

“I don’t mind. I have plenty of others, and I don’t want you getting cold! Those blankets they offer from the commissary do  _ nothing _ for retaining body heat. It’s a good thing this place tends to run on the warmer side otherwise I’d worry about your soldiers freezing while they slept!”

He exhaled in a way that might have been a laugh. “Thank you.”

“Of course! Can’t let my lab partner freeze, right?” She jostled his arm, grinning. Especially not after she just got him back.

“...Right.” He set the folded blanket down on a table. “Entrapta…” he paused. “Entrapta.” He really didn’t need to be saying her name so much, she was right there and already paying attention to him. But, at the same time, she definitely was not about to stop him. “Are you really alright?”

Oh. Heavy question, serious tone, this was not a joking situation. She could grasp that much. 

She examined what she was feeling at the current time. Hungry and tired, but those weren’t so much feelings as they were a result of her forgetting to eat and sleep, so those probably didn’t count. She was happy, because she was back where she belonged and she was with Hordak and he didn’t hate her. She was also scared, because she was back in the Fright Zone and Catra was still here and probably would not be happy to see her. She was… curious, of course, to see what Hordak had been working on in her absence. And she was… worried? That something might go wrong, that this was temporary, that she’d hit her head or something and she would wake up back in the transport and this time she might not be able to hack it and get herself home.

Home. Is that what the Fright Zone was? She didn’t feel much of an attachment to it, then again she’d never felt much of an attachment to Dryl either. She could work anywhere. It wasn’t the location so much as it was—

“Entrapta?”

—The people.

Hordak looked worried again. Of course. She’d just been standing there in silence.

Things were not bad. At the same time, they were not good. She could lie and say she was just peachy, but she never really saw the merit in lying. She could explain in detail what she was feeling, but that would probably not help alleviate his worry whatsoever. So she’d be honest, but succinct.

She smiled, reaching over to take his hand in one of hers, patting it with the other.

“I’ll be okay,” she said. And she would.

Because she was home.


End file.
